Category: Sexual Harassment

NO MORE. I AM JANE DOE.

Do not whisper the truth

as it would be considered rude—

NO

It is what they expect and say.

Tuck the scars away,

Shove them into the junk drawer.

NOT AGAIN

Politely smile and wave,

Making sure you’ve nothing

To disturb anyone else’s day.

Do not ruin their futures

For it was just a boyish mistake.

EVER FOR ANY GIRL

Stay silent and save

Your future too

That way.

Smile and wave.

Yes, make nice.

OR ANY WOMAN

Do not offend.

Do not be rude

By allowing your scars

To smash and intrude.

Keep subjects to bleached blandness

Of weather, pets, and binge worthy TV.

NO MORE

Do not be rude.

Do not offend

By showing your scars,

Freeing them from the dusty junk drawer.

Stay in smiling silence.

Smiling silence–

NO MORE. I AM JANE DOE

The Brave Ones

(A Tribute to Christine Blasey Ford)

We reject the mother
Born to subservience
of ripped rib bone.
No longer will we accept
Bloody beatings and brutality,
Rape and rage,
Silent,
Powerless,
Fearful.
No longer do we accept this pain
As payment for the sin
Of seeking knowledge.

For millennia, we were lucky to live unbruised
As long as we were your possessions:
Your mothers, your daughters,
Your sisters, your wives.
As long as you owned us
And we did as we were told.

But through the ages,
The brave ones have shown us another way:
To seek the spirit of our true mother,
The one born in the same earth of equality.

So we find her voice and our own.
We speak.
Though you would silence us
With vitriol and mockery,
The brave ones have taught us well;
We will never be silent again.

Power Rises

The Lady went dark,

feeling the decline.

The dawn trembled,

as the power of the mother raised

a sisterhood united.

 

While the capricious one

and his band of merry fools

turned tiny hands

to the magician’s tools

of distraction and deflection,

whipping their devout disciples

to a rabid, foamy hate,

ready to trample their different siblings.

 

Thus, the mother within the sisterhood

and a faction of the brotherhood

joins them to rise,

persisting in resisting

to protect a nation

for the next generation.